Smyrna times., 1887-06-08
SMYRNA DEL WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON 8,
A Cathedral for New York.

The scheme for a great Protestant
Episcopal cathedral in New York,
costing Sc, 900, 900, as outlined by Bishop
Potter, is a magnificent one and will
undoubtedly enlist the interest and at
tiOn of the whole community. There
are already several Episcopal cathe-
drals or bishops churches in this coun-
try, the most notable one being that in
Garden City, Long Island. But for
various reasons these cathedrals have
not fulfilled the expectations of those
who built them, and they certainly
have not enlisted popular interest and
support. This may be due partly to
the fact that they have not been
adequately endowed, and partially be-
cause they have been regarded as or
namental rather than useful adiuncts
to the work of the Church Then it
has been felt in many quarters that the
cathedral system was an essentially
English idea, foreign to the genius and
institutions of this country.
But none of these objections will ap-
ply to the proposed cathedral. In the
first place, it will stand in the metropO-
lis, not merely of the United States,
but of the American continent, and in a
certain sense will belong to the whole
nation. 1t will be a splendid religious
shrine, worthy of great people, and it
may in time become the religious forum
of the Protestant Christianity of this
country. 1t would, as Bishop Potter
says, offer Ito all men, of whatever
condition or fellowship, the ministra-
tiOns of religion in a language under
stood by the common people, bidding
their pulpits the ablest and most hon
ored teachers, free for meditation, de-
vOtiOn or rest at all hours, without fee
or restriction" and thus be a witness
to the brotherhood of humanity in the
bond of the Divine NaZarene, and OF
the need of the human heart for some
worthy place and voice for the express
sion of its deepest needs. Such
building would of necessity, under
our present condition, require to be ad.
ministered by the Church under whose
control it would be reared, but its wei
come would be for all men of whatsO.
ever fellowship, and influence would
be felt in the interests of our common
Christianity throughout the whole
land.n
But the cathedral will be even more
than a great house of worship. 1t will
be the centre of missionary ard educa
tiOnal effort and influence which viii
extend all through the State and ever
to the Western frontier. 1t will EN-
body in tangible and practical form the
ideas of charity and philanthropy
which are so deeply imbedded in Chris
tianity, but which too often fail to fine
an adequate expression. And with it
complete and well equipped organiza
it will do this work far better than it i
now done through the hap-hazard ef
forts of a number of semi-independen
organizations. 1t will in fact be grea
clearing house Of practical religion
work
The cathedral will also be the natur
, al and proper place in which will b
heard the great preachers of the Angli
can communion in Great Britain AM
: the United States, and in which the,
! will command an audience worthy q
them and the metropolis. Moreover
! it is among the possibilities of the fu
! ture that the present dream of CHRIS
I tian unity may be so far reached tina
! the cathedral pulpit will be open i
= turn to all the great preachers of evan
gelical Protestant Christianity, thu
testifying to the essential oneness {
, our common Christianity. YOr
Tribune.